20.03.2025 Item no.12. Court No.29. S. De (Allowed) CRM (DB) No. 678 of 2025 In Re: An application for bail under Section 439 of the Code of Criminal Procedure corresponding to Section 483 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 in connection with Habra Police Station Case No. 907 of 2016 dated 03.11.2016 under Sections 376(D)/384 of the Indian Penal Code & Sections 447/448/323/376(D)/384 of the Indian Penal Code. And In the matter of : Surajit Mallick @ Suro & Ors. …Petitioners. Mr. Manojit Debnath, …for the Petitioner. Ms. Minoti Gomes, Ms. Chandreyi Dutta, …for the State. Dictated by Arijit Banerjee, J. 1. Service report filed by the State be kept with the records. In spite of service, nobody appears for the de facto complainant/victim. 2. Status report filed by the State be also kept with the records. 3. The petitioners are in custody for more than 8 years. 4. The State says that the last prosecution witness being the Investigating Officer of the case is now being examined in-chief. We see that after examination in-chief and cross-examination of this witness is over, there will be examination of the accused persons under Section 313 Cr.P.C. (Section 351 of B.N.S.S.), then arguments and then judgment will be delivered. It is unlikely that the trial will conclude within a short period of time. 8 years is a very long period of time to keep an accused undertrial in incarceration. 2 5. We further see that while rejecting the prayer of the petitioner no.1 and another accused person on August 16, 2024, in CRM (DB) 1961 of 2024, a co-ordinate Bench had directed the learned Trial Court to take all possible steps to complete the trial positively within 3 months from the date of communication of the order. Learned advocate for the petitioners says that the order was communicated on August 20, 2024. However, the trial is still pending. 6. Without touching the merits of the case and only on the touchstone of Article 21 of the Constitution of India, we are constrained to allow the petitioners’ prayer for bail. 7. Accordingly, we direct that the petitioners, namely, Surajit Mallick @ Suro, Raju Mallick, Dilim Brahma @ Mona and Nivash Sarkar @ Nibas shall be released on bail upon furnishing a bond of Rs.10,000/- each, with two sureties of like amount each, one of whom must be local to the satisfaction of the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, Barasat, North 24- Parganas, subject to the condition that the petitioners shall remain within the jurisdiction of the Barasat police station, except for the purpose of attending Court proceedings and shall meet the O.C/I.C. of the Barasat police station, on each and every alternate date, until further orders. 8. The petitioners shall appear before the trial Court on every date of hearing until further orders and shall not intimidate the witnesses and/or tamper with evidence in any manner whatsoever. 3 9. In the event the petitioners fail to adhere to any of the conditions stipulated above without justifiable cause, the trial court shall be at liberty to cancel the petitioners’ bail in accordance with law without further reference to this court. 10. The application for bail is, accordingly, allowed. 11. All parties shall act in terms of server copy of the order downloaded from the official website of this Court. (Apurba Sinha Ray, J.) (Arijit Banerjee, J.)